The Bus Ride

The bus ride to Guanajuato didn’t go nearly as smoothly as on my previous visit. Of course, this time I was traveling solo, which is not always a bad thing (depending on who your traveling partner is) because you can pay more attention to the scenery going by. From Ojinaga to Chihuahua everything went well. It was after I got to the Chihuahua bus terminal that things started going weird.

First, I had to wait an hour and a half, still not so bad. Mexican bus terminals are fabulous places to people-watch, I had plenty to read if I wanted, and I wasn’t hungry (still stuffed from the incredible meal Steve and I had at Cazuales in Ojinaga … yum). BUT, when–like a good girl–I visited the public (pay) toilet just prior to departure time, I couldn’t get my giant bag through the turnstile and locked it up. (Linda Walker calls this bag the-great-Mother-of-God suitcase because it’s, well, it’s huge, but hey, I had to pack for five weeks.) After a nice but non-English speaking gentleman helped me maneuver said bag (Oh yeh, did I mention that it weighed almost 70 pounds? And why did I need to bring so many books anyway?), the machine had already swallowed my money, which was all the change I had (extremely poor planning on my part; now Steve would have had the correct change times five).

So, after having made a small spectacle of myself during the GMOG-bag-stuck-in-the-turnstile incident, I asked a really nice couple (well, they looked nice and I think they really were), also English-challenged, if they’d watch my bag while I got some change and they agreed and laughed. Gee, I wonder why. Tick, tick, tick. The clock kept going even though I hadn’t. Yet. And it can be a potentially seriously embarrassing situation after enough time passes, thank you very much. Finally, after I had taken care of business (whew), I retrieved my bag from Nice Couple and profusely thanked them in my pitiful español, then headed out to find my bus.

IT WASN’T THERE.

I double-, triple-checked my ticket, which had the bus number written on it by the nice ticket salesgirl. No such bus. Not even a bus from the other lines (I had selected Omnibus’ primera clase) going to León, my next stop. Had I missed it whilst fighting the toilet turnstile? I was on the verge of tears, screaming, or crawling into fetal position while sucking my thumb mode. I stood there staring at my ticket as if it was going to magically save me.

Over at the little refreshment station, one of the coffee-drinking bus drivers must have noticed my dumbstruck look, because he came over and looked at my ticket. “Ah,” he said (that's universal language for “I know what’s wrong with this crazy gringa,”) and pointed at an Omnibus about to pull out of the gate. It didn’t have the same number as my ticket and its destination sign said “Queretaro,” but it turned out to be the one I was supposed to take. I skedaddled aboard quickly, mainly to get out of earshot of the baggage handler who had to load GMOG into an already full baggage compartment, complete with barking dog in its kennel, wondering what it’d done to deserve its outrageous time-out in the belly of a Mexican bus.

I stuffed my computer bag in the overhead, plopped my pillow and camera bag on the seat beside me, buckled up, tilted the seat back, and prepared to recover from my little incident. And maybe reapply deoderant. We hadn’t gone 20 miles before it started pouring rain, the leftover remnants of Hurricane Dolly. After nearly one whole blissful minute, I noticed that the floor of the bus was puddling up with rain, coming in from my window. Of course–my window! Which was broken. Thankfully I’d put my camera bag on the seat next to me and not on the floor. The bus was about three-fourth filled, so I was lucky to have an empty seat next to me. Since the ride was going to be about 18 to 20 hours long, I was looking forward to the extra sleeping room. But alas (universal language for "oh shit"), it was not to be.

About 30 minutes after the rain began, we came across a stranded bus and we stopped to completely fill our bus with those poor passengers. Plus two people who opted to stand in our bus's aisle rather than wait by the side of the road for the next bus. A plump little old lady chose the seat next to me; she appeared exhausted from her ordeal and sat with her eyes closed. I held my camera bag in my lap (yes, it was also heavy because I'd stuck a couple or five books in case I wanted to read on the bus) and drifted off to sleep, until my legs went numb from the weight. I shifted the bag to the top of my feet and dozed off until the little old lady put her hand on my leg. By then it was dark and she was snoring softly, so I gently moved her hand back to her own lap, and dozed again, only to be awaked by the hand on my leg, inner leg, this time. I not so gently picked up the hand and saw that that the little old lady wasn't sitting next to me anymore–it was a strange man! My mind raced as he gently snored. Was he really sleeping? Was this a deliberate act of molestation of some sort? I shoved my camera bag into the seat between us and put my arm on top of it. Of course, a 20-pound camera bag being shoved into his side woke him up with a start, then he immediately went back to sleep. He wouldn’t “accidentally” touch me again, I hoped. Everyone else on the bus was sleeping, even the babies. Everyone but the driver. And me. I was adequately freaked out enough now that I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep at all. After what seemed a really long time, I checked my watch. 12:24. It was a very, very long night.

Fortunately, when we got to Zacatecas just before daybreak, enough people disembarked so that I could move to another seat. From Zacatecas to León, there were no more incidents (other than the most beautiful smile from an adorable curly-haired toddler in the seat across the aisle!).

Buses leave León on the hour for Guanajuato. This time I chose wisely and got the nicest line, ETN, which has a row of cushy single seats on one side of the bus and cushy doubles on the other. As I picked up my complimentary drink and sat down, I noticed that the very same MAN was on the bus! There he sat, snoring softly away in his single seat where he would not freak out any proper lady passengers.

But I’m here now and all’s well. Sure am tired though. I’ve got a lot of sleeping to catch up on!